aspects of Japanese language and user needs were going

to effortlessly keep the “black phones” at bay.

Many attribute this to the “Galapagos Effect”, so

called because of the similarities between the way some

categories have developed in Japan and the way that

scientists theorise that animals evolved in isolation on

the Galapagos Islands, which are found in the Pacific

Ocean off Ecuador. The isolation of the islands meant

that species there evolved quite independently of their

common ancestors — producing unique adaptations,

not to be found elsewhere.

As so it was said that Japan’s cell-phone industry

developed in this way.